The US labor market has been slow to recover from the deep recession of 2007–2009. As of September 2011, there were almost seven million fewer jobs than before the downturn. Policymakers have debated numerous ways to increase employment, from government spending to tax policy to training and education initiatives. But relatively little consideration has been given to immigration reform as a way to boost the economy, even though immigration policy affects innovation and job growth. Instead, the immigration debate has become painfully deadlocked, with widespread agreement that the current system is broken but little consensus on how it should be fixed. In these challenging times, more should be done to identify incremental changes to immigration policy that could be made immediately to boost employment for US workers and accelerate the country’s economic recovery.
To better understand the potential for immigration policy to help rejuvenate the US economy, policymakers need answers to basic questions such as whether the foreign born take jobs from the native born or instead create more jobs, on balance, and what types of immigrants generate the most jobs for native-born workers. Although numerous studies have explored how immigration affects natives’ wages, there is relatively little research on how immigration affects employment among US natives. This study seeks to fill this gap and answer the question of what specific changes to immigration policy could speed up American job growth. Read full analysis at AEI>>>
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